Review of Mortal Engines (2018) by Carlotta 4 — 14 Dec 2018

I actually really enjoyed this film, it's got to be one of the few films in recent years that didn't actively annoy me at one point either with burdonsome plot, annoying characters, or UNBEARABLE modern slang. But I did have to take a few points off anyway to be fair, because even though I really liked it and plan on buying a copy for my shelf I do still need to acknowledge that there are a few characters and subplots that could have been cut rather than glossed over. I mean, thank heaven they were glossed over at all! It would have been awful if they'd actually tried to devote time to those subplots (the "movies actively annoying me" thing I mentioned earlier)! So I think 4 stars is about right for this film--enjoyment wise I would say I got 5 stars out of it, but plot-wise it's about a 3 and a half or 4.

The focus of the film is where it should be. On the two main characters and on the visuals of the giant city monster machine. We all know the film was made basically for the mad max-style chase of a giant city crushing up smaller ones--that's kind of what we're paying the ticket for but fortunately the film does also CARE about its main two characters and what they're going through. It devotes an appropriate amount of time towards them and the various scenarios they end up in and I did end up actually believing in their chemistry and what risks they ended up taking to save one another. That was surprisingly sweet in a film about a giant city eating things. And it's little "surprises" like that that made me enjoy this film, the color choices, the "look" of the tech and worldbuilding, the mercifully few pop culture jokes ended up being actually FUNNY rather than annoying... etc.

I think my main complaint for the film would be the human action scenes. The city ones were great--pretty much anything on a large scale was fantastic, but when you got to human on human combat the camera was a bit too shaky cam to follow what was going on. It wasn't detracting from my overall enjoyment (because again, the focus of the film is on those large scale shots and the two main characters) but I do wish that those fight scenes had been good as well because it would have elevated the overall film.